Network Infrastructure

A hospital's network infrastructure is the foundation upon which its IT systems are built. Establishing a connection between providers and patients within a single hospital, or between a hospital and a larger state- or nationwide health information network allows providers to better coordinate care and retrieve data across a wide spectrum.

A Northern California hospital has acknowledged that its electronic health record system went dark for more than a week, which resulted in clinicians unable to access patient medical records and even having to postpone serious medical treatments.

Healthcare organizations willing to break the tried-and-true approach to acquiring IT products are creating applications that are more closely aligned with their needs. And potentially getting equity in a successful startup.

The $28.1 billion carrot paid out to meaningful EHR adopters to date has spurred significant EHR adoption specifically among emergency and outpatient departments, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics, which has already achieved Stage 7 on the HIMSS Analytics scale, will pick up its 2014 enterprise Davies Award at HIMSS15 this April. How did they do it? We ask their leaders.

As he prepares to embark on one of the largest IT implementations in recent memory, Mayo Clinic CIO Cris Ross explains the thinking behind the choice of Epic for EHR and revenue cycle, and lays out his next steps.

Since 2009, Regional Obstetrical Consultants (ROC) has operated the Solutions to Obstetrics in Rural Counties (STORC) project, a telemedicine program that delivers care in rural areas to women with at-risk pregnancies who would otherwise have little or no access to greatly needed, high-risk care. Learn how the physicians at ROC have implemented a telemedicine solution to bring mobile healthcare to remote locations.

ITaaS provides healthcare organizations with the ability to lower operational costs, restructure from capital to operating expenses, and improve service levels. This white paper offers best practices regarding the technology infrastructure, business processes, and IT organizational structure to help healthcare providers maximize the value and impact of ITaaS across their organizations.

Many healthcare organizations are recognizing the need for a more efficient and effective approach for addressing the HIPAA Security and Privacy rules, and other evolving compliance and security challenges. This paper explores one such solution: unified security monitoring.
Unified security monitoring goes well beyond simplifying and automating HIPAA compliance. With always-on coverage and protection, it provides a mechanism for strengthening a healthcare organization’s overall security posture, while reducing ongoing operational risk.

Within the wide scope of use for wireless communications, the ability to use radio frequency for identification and location tracking has become very prevalent. This white paper provides a look into how RTLS is helping hospitals save money and how early adopters have paved the way for a widespread acceptance.

The case for telemedicine in today’s healthcare world is rapidly changing. Not only does it reduce the costs of chronic care, it has been shown to improve outcomes. This white paper discusses where Telemedicine is today and where it's headed, based on technologies that are available and the increasing rate of adoption.

Cloud-based Microsoft Exchange service features all the mission critical enterprise-class communication and collaboration capabilities of an in-house solution without the unpredictable costs and management headaches. With flexible customization options, healthcare organizations can seamlessly move to a cloud-based solution without compromising security or altering their current encryption approach.

As healthcare providers implement health IT to comply with federal mandates and participate in quality of care programs, VNA solutions can play a critical role in helping them meet their needs today and in their future IT initiatives. Forward-thinking healthcare providers around the world are already successfully meeting this challenge with VNA. Download this Healthcare IT News eBook to learn how VNA enables exchange, supports data consolidation and IT simplification.

In this webinar you will learn how Sutter Health pioneered the integration between Epic EMR and RightFax. Brett Reed, Sr. Engineer at Sutter Health, will review the Epic and RightFax integration and how RightFax streamlined their outbound faxing needs by moving to a fax server.

Molina Healthcare providers managed healthcare services for over 4.3 million people in 16 states. Rajendra Kadam, IT Director at Molina Healthcare,will review the process of doctor authorizations at Monila and the improved efficiencies in implementing a fax server.

In this webinar you will learn about the healthcare information exchange and how fax plays a vital role in all healthcare organizations. Greg Horton, Program Development at OpenText, will review how suppliers, providers, payers and pharmacy organizations implement RightFax in order to keep documents secure and costs down while remaining compliant.

Historically, physician and nursing systems and workflow have been parallel, but independent, of each other. In looking at what is currently available, it is obvious that very few, if any, intersect where they should: at the patient.

The healthcare system is moving away from fee-for-service models that reward fragmented care toward fee-for-value models that reward a more holistic continuum of care. But many organizations lack the care coordination software to succeed in this new environment.

There has been a lot of press lately about care coordination, and how it will play a significant role in improving patient outcomes. But despite all of this positive coverage, inter-organizational care coordination is far from becoming a reality.

As talks continue about big data and how to aggregate and share it electronically, we need to keep our ultimate goal in sight – giving providers the information required to better manage the health of the individual patient, in real time at the point of care.

Physicians are highly engaged with social media for both personal and professional use, according to a 4,033-clinician study authored and conducted by QuantiaMD, the largest mobile and online physician community, and Care Continuum Alliance, an international association for wellness, prevention and care management.

Two Indianapolis-based companies have partnered to launch a social media service for health care organizations. CoreTech Revolution LLC and Cast a Bigger Net LLC have formed Social Media & Medicine to help with legal, policy and training issues.

KLAS today announced the release of their highly anticipated 2011 Top 20 Best in KLAS Awards: Medical Equipment & Infrastructure report. The coveted awards are based solely on data from customer surveys of hospital and clinic executives, administrators, physicians, nurses, clinicians, and other directors and managers interacting with healthcare equipment and infrastructure solutions.

Nuesoft Technologies Inc. and Point and Click Solutions, Inc. today announced their collaboration on The College Health Technology Pathway Program, an initiative to educate college health professionals about the risks and flaws of hosted application service provider systems (ASPs), which are not designed for mission critical health care software applications, and thus leave users' data vulnerable.

CareTech Solutions, an information technology and Web products and services provider for more than 180 U.S. hospitals and health systems, announced today that St. Luke's Hospital & Health Network (SLHHN) in Bethlehem, PA. selected the company to provide remote 24/7/365 IT infrastructure monitoring from CareTech's Healthcare Infrastructure Operations Center (HIOC), a technology hub for the storing and monitoring of data, systems and applications located in Troy, Mich.

Earlier this year, President Obama outlined his plan to create a 21st-century regulatory system that is simpler and smarter and that protects the health and safety of the American people in a pragmatic and cost-effective way. He called for a change in culture to incorporate ongoing review of regulations into our operations. We can target rules already on the books to increase flexibility and remove regulations that are out-of-date, unnecessary, excessively burdensome, or in conflict with other rules.

Geisinger Health System has selected the Orion Health Rhapsody Integration Engine as the health system’s new platform for migrating, managing, and streamlining message exchange among more than 200 clinical and business systems.

The Physicians Foundation, a nonprofit organization that seeks to advance the work of practicing physicians and improve the quality of healthcare for all Americans, awarded a $1 million dollar grant to Health Leads, an organization devoted to helping vulnerable families by arranging for college volunteers to partner with physicians in hospitals across the country.

Biamp Systems today announced that its Vocia critical paging and life safety system has been installed as part of the technical upgrade underway at Providence St. Vincent Medical Center, the only Oregon hospital to make the list of Thomson Reuters 100 Top Hospitals 10 times.

CareView Communications, Inc. ("CareView" or the "Company") (OTCQB: CRVW), an information technology provider to the healthcare industry, announced that it has closed a $20 million financing with funds managed by HealthCor Partners Management, L.P. and HealthCor Management, L.P. (together, "HealthCor"). The financing involved the issuance of senior secured convertible notes in the aggregate principal amount of $20 million together with common stock purchase warrants. HealthCor is a leading investment manager in the healthcare and life sciences sectors.

CDW LLC (CDW), a leading provider of technology solutions to business, government, education and healthcare, today released the findings of its Video Conferencing Straw Poll Report. The report finds that half of companies use some form of video conferencing today and another quarter plan to implement the technology within the next two years. Video conferencing adoption, driven by reduced operating costs, improved decision making and improved communication, will branch out beyond simple peer-to-peer devices into more cutting-edge collaborative video conferencing systems, such as immersive telepresence.

Learn how the University of Pennsylvania’s Health System transformed its information system via digitization. What started as an intention to reduce the paper load generated by a single patient visit, turned into a comprehensive overhaul of the hospital’s medical and financial records. The end result? Dramatically increased efficiencies across all departments. Learn More

Healthcare financial accounts are becoming the first line in consumer-driven healthcare interaction. Health plans that don't offer health spending accounts are missing out on the critical early consumer interaction that drives loyalty. Learn about key trends and important changes in health spending accounts and health plan administration, and find out how health plans and TPAs scope and implement the right solutions for themselves and their customers. Learn More

The explosion of mobile health and advances in medical technology has been accompanied by a parallel increase in acute-care complexity and coordination challenges. Today, test results, x-rays and even snapshots of wounds can be shared among clinicians in less time than it takes to go from one hospital floor to another, and patients are being treated by an increasing array of specialists – thanks to the flexibility of mobile health technology. Learn More

Memorial Hermann's expansion into the health insurance business is a key component to realizing its new vision to "advance health." Hear how this health system overcame challenges and took advantage of opportunities on its journey to develop value-added health plans and employer solutions. Learn More

Video

What's new at HIMSS15?

Carla Smith, MA, CNM, FHIMSS, Executive Vice President of HIMSS, previews areas new to the conference this year including the Cybersecurity Command Center and the HIMSS Health IT Value Suite.

We are at a cusp of the consumer driven health revolution. But to succeed, we need a new approach: one that goes beyond the apps and the sensors and makes better use of APIs to deliver the interoperability and security required to overcome our current challenges. More

You don't have to work in technology to know that hackers are getting more sophisticated. It seems like a new breach is in the news every week. But those of us who are dedicated to protecting healthcare data also spend a lot of time on something that's just as demanding. More

Joseph Kvedar, MD, recently wrote about the sign posts on the road to connected health adoption. Here, he outlines the connected health sign posts that are driving the change in attitude from "healthy skeptic" to "fear of missing out." More